—(above: a slice of king cake we had last year)Rouses is making what they are calling ‘gourmet’ king cakes: red velvet cream cheese, German chocolate, triple chocolate fudge, and black forest.

—In her NYT article late last month, Roberta Smith began, “By just about any measure, the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, which opened last month in this small town in northwest Arkansas, is off to a running start.” but also pointed out, “There is one huge blind spot in the collection up to 1900, and it is a very serious one in my book: the almost complete lack of paintings by largely self-taught or folk artists. This country’s folk art is as great and as original as any other art it has produced; its uncanny fusion of abstraction and representation, and of primitive and modern makes it the American equivalent of Sienese painting in the early Italian Renaissance. Leaving it out is like looking at the story of American art with only one eye.”

—Looking *so* forward to seeing George Lucas’ Red Tails, about the Tuskegee Airmen, out this weekend.

—The Grammy Awards are telecast February 12th this year, with several fewer categories, including five fewer in the American Roots category. Many changes. The NYT: “The most controversial cuts took place in the field known as American roots. Traditional blues and contemporary blues were put together, as were traditional and contemporary folk music. The awards for best album in Hawaiian, American Indian, and zydeco or Cajun music were thrown together in a single category called “regional roots music.””

The Beaumont Enterprise writes about Grammy nominee C.J. Chenier as the prince of Zydeco, here.

—So cute: our 3-year-old Shugie happened to have lunch with Mike Slive (SEC Commissioner) today and when he was asked to tell Mike ‘what does an elephant say?’ Shugie told him ‘Roll Tide!!’.

—Last week, Dr. Pepper pulled the plug on Dr. Pepper at Dublin Dr. Pepper (est. 1891 in Dublin, Texas), the world’s oldest Dr. Pepper bottler, and the only one to have always made it with real sugar (Imperial Sugar!) instead of changing the recipe to nasty HFCS (corn syrup).

That’s it for us buying Dr. Pepper. We used to have Dublin Dr. Pepper ship to us for Passover (one of our six-packs, pictured above, more below.) since corn is forbidden during the observance and since Dublin made it with sugar, it was fine… It was so fantastic to drink it out of those fantastic glass bottles too.

According to Reuters:After more than 100 years, Dr Pepper Bottling Co. in Dublin, Texas stopped making its signature beverage last week as part of an agreement reached after Dr Pepper Snapple Group sued the 40-person bottling company over trademark and territory issues.

Nancy Wooldridge, executive director of the Chamber of Commerce, said the town of 4,000 suffered a “heart attack” as production stopped and workers removed signs reading “Dublin Dr Pepper” from the bottling plant.

The secret to Dublin Dr Pepper’s success was that the bottler made it using Imperial pure cane sugar. Dr Pepper made with the sugar — as opposed to corn syrup — will still be available, but Dublin-labeled bottles are no more, and Dr Pepper will not be bottled at that plant.

That has left many in this small town two hours west of Dallas — which designates itself “Dr Pepper, Texas” for an annual festival each year — bitter and disappointed.

…..But thousands of Dublin Dr Pepper supporters have signed online petitions or indicated support for a boycott of Dr Pepper Snapple Group. A petition at change.org had 14,517 signers by Friday afternoon, and 18,253 supporters “liked” the “I Support Dublin Dr Pepper” Facebook page.

Dubliners and other Texans have rallied around the beverages still to be produced there, including Triple XXX Root Beer.

—(and of all things, she likes the chips at Central in Memphis — my pic from our lunch there, above:)

This week on NPR – All Things Considered: ‘4258 Miles of Meat: Chef, Dad on a Quest for BBQ‘: “Until this fall, chef Molly Baz was working at an upscale Michelin-starred restaurant in New York City. But she decided to give that up to go on a road trip.

Molly wanted to learn everything she could about variations in American barbecue, so she planned a tour of the country’s most renowned barbecue regions and invited her father, photographer Doug Baz, along for the ride. The pair documented their travels on their blog, Adventures in BBQ.”

and

“”I think that we pretty much hit the jackpot in Texas,” Molly says. “Truly, Texas blew our minds. I’ve never tasted a more delicious piece of unadulterated meat in my life.””

…and from their Tumblr: Things We’ll Miss: -the Southern Hospitality attitude: nowhere have I encountered such friendly, open and generous people. We’ve gotten more free food, desserts, barbecue sauces and snacks for the road than we deserved. The abundance of biscuits: I told you and I’ll say it again, no one makes biscuits this well up north…